Film Review

By Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat

Alice in Wonderland
Directed by Nick Willing
Hallmark Home Entertainment 05/99 DVD/VHS Feature Film
PG

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll (the pseudonym for Charles Ludwidge Dodgson, a mathematics teacher and clergyman from Oxford, England) have enchanted people of all ages. They have been translated into more than 40 languages and have inspired poems, songs, plays, and movies.

In this creative interpretation of the classic, Alice is played by Tina Majorino and joined by Academy Award-winners Whoopi Goldberg and Ben Kingsley along with Miranda Richardson, Martin Short, Christopher Lloyd, Robbie Coltrane, George Wendt, Peter Ustinov, and Gene Wilder.

Frightened of performing a song before guests at her parent's party, Alice follows a white rabbit down a hole and enters a strange world of the imagination. There she has a merry madcap adventure that includes encounters with a mouse whose lectures put people to sleep, a grinning Cheshire cat, an angry Queen of Hearts, a clumsy White Knight, a Mad Hatter, a March Hare, a Gryphon, a talking Tiger Lily, and, of course, Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Her crazy adventure teaches Alice about change, the multiple uses of words, curiosity, nonsense, and the great mysteries of life.

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by Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat